Unable to network between windows xp & 7

I have a wired desktop that has XP on it and my new laptop has Win 7 wireless and when I first set up this network it was a bit unstable, but I've seen online where that was not out of the normal, but long story short I got a new, larger hard drive for the desktop and imaged it over, but when I attempted to re-setup the network, I'm having zero luck and haven't been able to figure out why. As before I had zonealarm loaded. I've even tried setting up a new newtork and making the disk/usb that I then plug into the laptop and it prompts me thru the same setup with no luck. I DO get the internet on both machines. Thanks in advance for any tips I can try.

So you could share files before the new hard drive but not now? Did you undo it all on both machines and try setting it up from scratch? I dislike firewalls on home LANs they normally cause more issues than they solve. Is ZA still in the picture?

Can you ping the IP addresses and names back and forth?

Yes, I had it set up on the old, smaller hard drive in my desktop, but I reset my old hard drive back to factory settings before imaging it over to the new hard drive, so it would be a clean start. So I easily made a connection with my router and reconnected to the internet. I do still have ZA loaded on my new hard drive.

Ok, so I FINALLY got the network where the two computers can see one another and I have on the desktop your typical shared folder that I can access but I also have another drive set to share and I can't access it. It says "you may not have permisson to use this network resource."

If I am not mistaken Win 7 really hates sharing an entire drive. I can't remember right off hand but from what I recall getting it to do it is a pain in the butt. It's not just a couple clicks, try googling sharing a drive in Win 7.

Ok I put everything on that drive under a subfolder and made that shared instead of the entire drive and it still gives me the same rejection. This drive is a external portable drive, but like I said it allowed me to share that drive before. I since added more shared folders on my C: drive and it gives me no problem. ??

This external is connected to which? Win 7 is such a pain in the butt when it comes to sharing. Its supposed to be simple but its not.

The external drive is attached to my desktop PC with Windows XP. Yeah it's starting to make me believe it's a pain! Win 7 seems to only want to play nice with Win 7!

I have two words.

Good Luck!

Seriously, networking between windows 7 and predecessors are a real pain in the but. I do this for a living and it does not always work as you hoped it would be.

FOUND THE ANSWER!!

I ran across this on Cnet's site and it made my network work like a charm now!


by serendipitee - 1/24/10 6:29 PM In reply to: How to share a USB external hard drive on a home network by ilympt


Hi all,
I faced the same problem and solved the problem by googling around and after I this page:
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?...kb;en-us;177078

Follow the below instruction and restart computer.

1. Click Start, and then click Run.
2. Type regedit, and then click OK.
3. Navigate to the following key:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Services\LanmanServer\Parameters
4. In the right pane, double-click the IRPStackSize value.
NOTE: If the IRPStackSize value does not already exist, use the following procedure to create it:
a) In the Parameters folder of the registry, right-click the right pane.
Point to New, and then click DWord Value.
c) Type IRPStackSize.

IMPORTANT: Type "IRPStackSize" exactly as it is displayed because the value name is case-sensitive.
5. Change the Base to decimal.
6. In the Value Data box, type a value that is larger than the value that is listed.

If you created the IRPStackSize value using the procedure described in step 4, the default value is 15. It is recommended that you increase the value by 3. Therefore, if the previous value was 11, type 14, and then click OK.
7. Close the Registry Editor.
8. Restart the computer.

Actually for me the solution worked only after changed the decimal value to 21.
good luck guys.


Here's the link to the entire thread. Thanks

http://forums.cnet.com/5208-6122_102-0.html?threadID=246730